Fish

Do you have a fish problem? you have just brought a bowl put fish in it and they are dead the next day? The shop told you the four goldfish you have brought will be fine in the bowl as fish only grow to the size of the tank. Did they tell you you just fill it from the tap and wait until its room temperature then drop the fish in?

What a load of lies, all common things but it all so wrong.

The  water, Tap water is "cleaned" with chlorine, yes its a small amount but its there, chlorine is lethal to fish. You should buy and add a dechlorinator before you add fish.

Fishless cycle. This gets your filter ready for the fish, basically you add a small amount of fish food to the tank and let it decay, this starts off what is called the nitrogen cycle.

Change the water when its green(ish) Fish eat and this means they produce "waste" where is it going to go? Did you install a toilet? no.  I thought not. Imagine you live in a small swimming pool and there is no toilet, how long before the water is not clear and smelly? same goes for fish, you need to fit a filter system to cope with the waste.

Fish grow to the size of the tank, they do, they grow until there is no more room in the tank and in the process they die a horrible death. Take any living thing, it grows until its reached its maturity, a human for example, starts life as a baby say 7lbs then grows to an adult around 120lbs who says when to stop growing? no one, like wise a dog, starts off small and cute stops growing when its big, life is like that, so why should a fish be different? they are not. They grow until they reach their full size, not the size of the tank. A mature goldfish can be over 30 cm in length.

Fish forums, you have a fish problem, you ask on a forum just as the following shows:

My young child has a new starter tank (13L) with filter and decorations. We followed the instructions for setting it up and 24 hours later added two goldfish.

24 hours later one jammed itself behind the filter and died. I realised we had the filter on high setting (oops) so turned it to slow and replaced the fish.

Yesterday the other original fish did the same thing! The shop tested the water and confirmed it is ok! What is going wrong?

Apart from they will tell you the tank is too small, and what is the water quality readings? ("OK" from the fish shop is not good enough) and you added the fish too soon, how do you really expect to get the actual reason why the fish did that? If you look through forums you will often see questions like this, all with the same type of replies, but the actual answer will never be known other than the fish was stressed (stress easily kills fish) So if you have a fish question, and ask on a fish forum (Not here please) always give as much information including water quality readings.

Water change, if its a fish tank then yes carry out a water change once a week minimum, but ponds, being as they are not so densely populated and have big filters o cope with the fish waste, its up to you.

Fish only have a two second memory. If that were true why is it that with koi in particular (as most koi keepers have big ponds and do things on a regular basis) that when the owner comes near the pond the fish come to the surface? its because they think its time to be fed, they know this because they remember (although they can't tell what the time actually is) Also if goldfish have a short memory how did this bloke train his fish?

Ponds, its the same for ponds, but only bigger.

Life expectancy, your fish died of old age at 3 years, again, wrong, a common goldfish if well looked after can live for over  10 years and grow to over 30cm long. Did you know goldfish are part of the carp family?

This site has it wrong? If all this is wrong why is it you are still reading it? Or why do fish shops sell bowls that are not suitable? simple, money. Your money. They want you to go back buy this buy that, because its more money for them. They know you will give up after a few months, but they have already had your money so most (not all) don't care.